(10-24-2024, 03:47 PM)putnam6 Wrote: Thats pretty cool but what is an election judge? Do you set up a specific precinct? You don't have early voting yet or is that just at specific locations
Regardless yes you have a responsibility to be prepared. Good to hear we have people of intelligence and integrity involved thats makes me feel better, and it's indicative of Texas.
I might have to tell my daughter who is a teacher to do the same.
Though I also believe the chances are slim all it takes is one incident. Hopefully, the huge mail-in and early voting will make it easier and more normal.
Lots of people I talk with just want a nice normal election and hope all sides turn down the smears and rhetoric
Our political discourse has devolved to where it's become its worst form, again both sides.
Locally and statewide we have had a huge early voting and mail-ins, supposedly over 20% of registered voters that hs to help lower the chaos and potential problems with long lines.
Hopefully, the TPTB learned how to be more efficient in the last 3 1/2 years, if states didn't learn from Florida in 2000 thats on each state's government.
Florida had chaos and fixed it all while being a hotly-contested state all of it was done with BIPARTISAN legislation fopr the greater good of the state and all of its citizens.
But of course, in 2000 both sides looked at the chaos as an embarrassment, whereas now the party with the most control looks at it as an opportunity to force legislation beneficial to their side.
When you walk into a polling place, look around at the machines and tables and everything in the area. The election judge is the one who sets them up... sometimes single-handedly. We are the "boss" of a polling location and when there's problems, it's up to us to solve them and get it right (the state will hold us accountable.)
Now, the procedures I know are for Texas, but I have reason to believe that they're similar all across the board. I now have a regular site but at one time I was a "floater" and went to whatever polling location within 30 miles here in Dallas that needed a judge.
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(NB: I'm the Democrat judge and there will be a Republican judge working with me. I'm the "head honcho" mainly because she prefers to NOT be the one in the "hot seat.")
3 weeks before election, I go to a 4 hour training and refresher course put on by the elections board where they remind us of procedures, hand us the thick (at least 100 pages) book and answer questions.
The week before the election (next week) I'll go talk to the people responsible for the site and go over the schedule (when I'll be setting up, so I don't interfere with their work) and contact my assigned clerks to tell them when to be at our location (and offer them the chance if they want to (paid) help me set up the site. I'll remind them to bring meds, food, drinks, and remind them of the "don't use your cell phone" rule.
Sunday I'll go to the Election Supply Pick Up and get my orange Judge Supply Case and enough clerk terminals for my clerks.
Monday afternoon (at my location) I'll set up. They deliver a huge box that's the tabulator (it and the voting machines are shown here: https://www.votemanatee.com/Election-Inf...xpressVote) and a big blue cabinet that holds the election supplies. My clerk (I volunteered my daughter) and I will set up the Expressvote machines (they're delivered in the Big Blue Cabinet. I have to haul them out and put them together (ours come with an integrated table and legs and they weigh about 25 lbs each It'll look like this) and then turn them on and make sure they work.
I have to get out the wireless router and plug it in, then set up the clerks' terminals (here they are, sitting in the warehouse)and make sure THEY turn on as well as setting up their ballot printers (and making sure those turn on) and then set up the judges' table with my own clerk terminal, the procedures book, the cell phone that has direct lines to the Judge Help Line, Voter Registration, and other things. I set up the machine for handicapped voters -- this is the one we take to the car if someone can't physically get into the building
If there's a problem with any of them, I call tech support, muy pronto.
Then I secure the area, lock the door, go home and contemplate my sins... err... get out the clothes I'll need and pack my lunch and premake coffee for the morning. I'll need lots.
I roll out of bed on election day at 5 am, fumble around and get myself dressed, and arrive at the polling location at 6 am. Some clerks will be there (they all have to be there by 7 am.) Once there are witnesses, I swear myself in and swear the clerks in. I go over the checklist with them and we turn on the machines.
The Republican judge and I break the seals on the tabulator (showing that I got it exactly as it came from the warehouse) and record the seal numbers AND put the seal in a special envelope to be returned. The big tabulator has to do a "zero printout" ... three copies of what's store in its database. It will print out the name of everyone on the ballot as well as the number of any proposition on the ballot. I can only do this when my Republican colleague is around because they have to verify the printout, watch it being printed and verify the zero count. I will also go over safety measures with the clerks.
The clerks put up the signage around the building and inside the building ("vote here") and the distance markers ("you are welcome to your opinion, but you can't electioneer beyond this point... and by the way, you can't wear campaign/candidate material inside this limit.") And the feather flag.This is a feather flag. We hates it, Precious. We hates it.
If there's problems, call tech support and go "AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA!!!" (and yes, I've had to do that on several occasions)
At 7 am on the dot, we open for business.
If there's a huge line, I'll check people in but mostly I'm there for crowd control and problem solving. If the equipment dies or has problems, I get to deal with it. If someone can't be found in the register of voters, I have to call headquarters and figure out why... if they're entitled to vote, I go through the provisional ballot procedures and let them vote. If there's someone who's frail or in pain in line, I can allow them to jump the line. I show people where to insert the ballots in the tabulator. I de-escalate situations and can call the Marshals if things get bad. I check the certification for poll watchers and shoo away people not authorized to linger.
When the monitors from the election committee show up (they check on us to see if we need anything and if the machines are okay), I'm the one who signs off on the forms.
The other judge and I will step in and take over clerk stations to allow them to rotate out for quick bathroom break or quick bite of lunch (many will eat at the desk.)
At 7pm, I go out and collect everyone in the parking lot and bring them inside. Anyone showing up at 7:01 or later can't vote because I've locked the door (election rules.)
AFTER voting is done (which can be very late if there's huge lines), the clerks go out and take down the signage. I start closing out the tabulator and tell the thing to print. It prints a HUGE long list in triplicate. My Republican colleague and I sign each of those copies. We shut down all the machines and pack them away. I fill out a million forms in quadruplicate (carbon copies...and maybe it's not a million but at midnight it sure feels like it.) Then I find the right envelopes for each of those copies and distribute them so that I have one set, and the others go back to the state and county. I have to keep mine for 2 years.
Student clerks with strict bedtimes are dismissed.
I go over the closing checklist (about 100 items, and I'm not kidding) and take the lovely orange Judges Case plus the clerk terminals plus the wireless router back to the Election Pick Up spot and wait my turn.
The folks on the receiving end (who probably won't get to bed before 7 am) check me in and if ANYthing is missing (no matter how small), I have to drive back to the site and fetch it. So... believe me, I make sure that EVERYTHING is there in the car.
Then I go home and FallOverDeadTHUD!
and that's how my election day in Texas will go.
